Wednesday Wrap-Up (and Open Thread)

I didn’t watch Obama’s SOTU. Between cooking and carpooling, I had neither the time nor the inclination. I’ve never been impressed by “Obama the Orator,” and his speech’s details had already been leaked, so the whole thing fell into the “Why Bother?” category. I did hear one interesting thing about it, though, while I was walking the dog and listening to Rush.

A caller named Jesse found Obama’s homage to Cory Remsburg off-putting. I too found it off-putting, but Jesse put his finger on the problem: Obama’s focus was about Remsburg the warrior but was, instead, about Remsburg the victim. Obama made no real mention of Remsburg’s actual service. Instead, Obama spoke about Remsburg’s injuries and his recovery (which is laudable, of course).

Obama could have given precisely the same speech been given about someone in a bad car accident. Jesse and Rush both noted that, in previous administrations, when the president celebrated this or that veteran, at least some of the praise focused on the veteran’s bringing war to the enemy. Now, though, the Left finds noteworthy only the injury part of “injured vets.”

Jesse felt, and I agree, that Obama’s purpose in talking about Remsburg was to highlight his opposition to the military, to America’s wars, and to the notion of manliness itself.

Glenn Kessler, the Washington Post’s resident “fact checker” seems to have soured on Obama. Rather than doing the old “false but accurate shtick” that characterized Obama’s first term, Kessler simply points out that Obama is making up things as he goes along.

I don’t believe Kessler has actually seen the light. As was true for all of the MSM, he knew what was going on the first time around, but wasn’t going to do anything that might derail a second term. Members of the Left might have gotten over its love affair with Obama, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t still wholeheartedly approve of his agenda.

***

A new book calling for a socialist revolution features contributions by Obama’s buddy Bill Ayers, among others. As you chew over that, think about this too: Back in the 1930s and onward through the end of the Soviet Union, the vast majority of Americans were staunchly opposed to Communism despite the fact that they really hadn’t seen it in action. Countries such as the Soviet Union or China were closed to them (or run through the Duranty-filter), so those Americans who hated Communism did so because they knew — without data — that Communism stifled freedom and created a tyrannical state.

The fall of the Soviet Union and the opening of China revealed that Communism was worse even than anyone had guessed. If you don’t believe me, just ask the kulaks that Stalin “re-educated” in the Ukraine or the Chinese who were around when Mao started his Great Leap Forward. Oh, wait! You can’t ask them because they’re dead. Depending on estimates, Stalin killed roughly 7,000,000 kulaks through execution or starvation. He was a piker compared to Mao, though, who killed 50,000,000 or more during his Great Leap forward, again through execution or starvation. Despite knowing these facts with certainty nowadays (rather than merely guessing them, as we once did), communism and socialism are no longer considered dirty words. This is what 40 years of Progressive education has wrought.

Of all the troubling aspects of the Obama presidency, none is more dangerous than the president’s persistent pattern of lawlessness, his willingness to disregard the written law and instead enforce his own policies via executive fiat. On Monday, Mr. Obama acted unilaterally to raise the minimum wage paid by federal contracts, the first of many executive actions the White House promised would be a theme of his State of the Union address Tuesday night.

The president’s taste for unilateral action to circumvent Congress should concern every citizen, regardless of party or ideology. The great 18th-century political philosopher Montesquieu observed: “There can be no liberty where the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or body of magistrates.” America’s Founding Fathers took this warning to heart, and we should too.

We are reentering Nixonian times, or perhaps worse, given that a free press at least went after Nixon’s misdeeds and misadventures. Now it has silenced itself for fear of harming a once-in-century chance for a fellow progressive’s makeover of America. We live in an age when a CNN moderator interrupts a presidential debate to help her sputtering candidate, and when a writer for the often ironic and sarcastic New Yorker sees no irony in doing a fawning interview with the president, tagging along on a shakedown jet tour from one mansion of crony capitalists to the next — as Obama preaches to the head-nodders about inequality and fairness in order to ensure that the bundled checks pour in.

Without the media acting as a watchdog, the administration has with impunity found the IRS useful in going after political opponents. When Obama’s IRS appointees were exposed, he for the moment called their deeds outrageous; when the media did not pursue the outrage, he wrote it off as a nothing story.

***

And finally, Megan McArdle points out that even Democrats are beginning to realize that there’s truth to the saying “be careful what you ask for; you might get it.” It turns out that when they have a president desirous of fulfilling their wish list, some of the more intelligent among them are realizing that this way lies economic madness. (Of course, that hasn’t stopped Al Franken from trying to push a constitutional amendment to forbid corporate speech, while keeping alive and well union, especially government union, speech. Apparently it’s not enough for him that almost all of the largest donors in politics are Leftist unions. He wants all of the largest donors to be Leftist unions.)

Share this:

Like this:

A new book calling for a socialist revolution features contributions by Obama’s buddy Bill Ayers, among others. [such as Michael Moore]

If Michael Moore is willing to fork over a substantial portion of his millions to little ol’ me, I guess I could support me some socialism.

What few people realize about Bill Ayers and his partner Bernadine Dohrn is that in 1974 they were among the co-authors of Prairie Fire, a book which advocated dictatorship of the proletariat for the United States. After all, dictatorship of the proletariat worked out so well in China and in the Soviet Union. Just ask the tens of millions who got free burials courtesy of the dictatorship of the proletariat. I could forgive Billy Boy and his friends some botched up bomb attempts- which did more damage to Weatherpeople than to others- but not his advocating dictatorship of the proletariat for the US- done after the 1973 Peace Accords.

Downeast Socialism beat Margaret Thatcher by over a decade on proclaiming that socialism was about “other people’s money.” Though in this tale, it wasn’t money, but hogs: “Damn you Enoch you know I got two hogs.” Bert & I were favorites of mine since high school. [Don’t like the bass in the background, but it was the only example I could find.]http://zombietime.com/prairie_fire/Prairie Fire

The idea that American wars are only where ground troops are committed because that’s the only way for enemies to fire back at Americans, is part of this American Arrogance thing overseas nationalities talk about. It gets more and more real as time goes by.

If America bombs someone that can’t retaliate, it’s not a war, just a police action. That’s why people call it hypocrisy. Because Americans themselves don’t consider it a police action when Americans get bombed.

Danny Lemieux

When 19th Century Colorado miner Alferd Packer was sentenced for the sin of gluttony, having had his fellow miners over for dinner during one particularly harsh winter, legend has it that the presiding judge told him,
“Stand up yah voracious man-eatin’ sonofabitch and receive yir sintince. When yah came to Hinsdale County, there was siven Dimmycrats. But you, yah et five of ’em, goddam yah. I sintince yah t’ be hanged by th’ neck ontil yer dead, dead, dead, as a warnin’ ag’in reducin’ th’ Dimmycratic populayshun of this county. Packer, you Republican cannibal, I would sintince ya ta hell but the statutes forbid it.”
I hope that it never comes to that, but…hmmm.

Mike Devx

Book, your Ted Cruz quote:Of all the troubling aspects of the Obama presidency, none is more dangerous than the president’s persistent pattern of lawlessness, his willingness to disregard the written law and instead enforce his own policies via executive fiat.

An intriguing question: When, in the USA, can we say that we are living under a dictatorship?

I’d say the Constitution doesn’t have to be abolished or explicitly violated, just ignored in certain ways. If Congress is not in charge of making law, but the Executive Branch is… are we not, in fact, then living under a dictatorship? What if only the “important laws” are effected by the Executive Branch?

The Executive Branch *is* Obama. Regardless of what he says, the buck stops there.

It’s not merely that he is lawless, it’s that his executive fiat means dictatorial action whenever he does it. So to what extent does that mean we are actually living under a dictatorship?

We are reentering Nixonian times, or perhaps worse, given that a free press at least went after Nixon’s misdeeds and misadventures.

The press wasn’t free back then. Their propaganda message would like people to believe they were free, when in fact they were just tools of the FBI sub director that got the Weathermen free from jail.

Gathering power to a class of journalists was the exact opposite of what freedom of press was supposed to mean. Freedom means to distribute power back where it belongs, not concentrate it on a bunch of unelected fascists that make money from their propaganda job.

Writing this blog is a labor of love. However, if you'd like to donate money for my efforts, please feel free to do so: